Kansai Soka High School Students Visit The Grauer School From Japan

From Yumi Miyamoto and Jessi Brown, World Languages Teachers, and Alicia Tembi, U.S. History Teacher:

Japanese students from Kansai Soka High School visited The Grauer School on January 27. They were greeted by 11th Grade students in Meyer Hall. Grauer students Oliver B. '27 and Will L. '27 shared the top 10 things that make Grauer unique including expeditions, close teacher-student relationships, and our incredible variety of arts offerings. The student groups began their discussions about what it means to be global citizens and why it matters, and each table created a poster symbolizing global citizenship. The students at each table summarized their discussions, and here are a few of the highlights:

~ "Kindness is a universal language."

~ "Knowledge about other people isn't enough to be a global citizen, compassion and courage are also essential."

~ "Global citizenship is being in a community with the whole world, not just a specific location."

The Japanese students then went to classes with Grauer students. All of them visited the Visual Arts classroom with Johnny King, where they screen-printed their own t-shirt with a special teddy bear design created by Raina N. '26 or a skateboarding gorilla design. They were given a tour of the campus in Japanese by Grauer students who are studying Japanese, and they participated in a scavenger hunt. They also saw a preview of "Romeo and Juliet" by High School Theatre students, and they sang "Let It Be" with High School Music students. At the end of the day, all of the Japanese students and Grauer students met in Meyer Hall to sing "It's A Small World" in Japanese, and then everyone gathered for a group photo.

The Japanese students were fascinated with Grauer’s educational culture, and our Grauer students loved the experience as well. Connecting with peers from around the world is truly a powerful tool for "Learning By Discovery®", a cornerstone of our Expeditionary Learning program.